As I began my journey in completing my 20% project for my learning and technology project, my goal was to learn to "live a healthier lifestyle." I began slowly working out on a regular basis and thus decided to change some of my eating habits. Being the "foody" I am, it was difficult to figure out what food substitutions I could make especially when it came to any types of bread and rice! Also, I am at times very reluctant to trying new things so that was also a difficulty I found myself having to overcome. As this semester is coming to an end, I found that yes, slowly but surely making small changes and working towards developing a habit actually works! I can happily say that my eating habits have changed for the better and I find myself wanting to workout even if it’s just for a short 1 mile run. For my digital pedagogy project, I decided to continue on with my 20% project and showcase some of my “cooking skills” and share some of the new recipes/substitutions I have been making.
In the last part of the book "Drive," Pink provides a what he calls a toolkit for Type I behaviors. In other words, he provides tips on how to be more intrinsically motivated and work towards Motivation 3.0. I found this part of the book to be my favorite part of the book as it was super helpful in many areas. One part I will share because it is also relevant to my 20% project is the tips Pink gives to "getting (and staying) motivated to exercise.
Pink give four tips to getting and staying motivated to exercise:
"Do something today, that your future self will thank you for." WIthin my 20% project I was seeking to "live a healthier lifestyle" and I believe that with this project, I am well on my way to succeeding in that aspect. I don't believe that my 20% project ends here though; I believe it is just the beginning for me. I have developed two great habits: working out on a regular basis and I have also developed much healthier eating habits. One aspect that I could improve on with this project is the aspect of building community, as I did not develop that element as well as the other two. Although I am setting an end to my 20% project for the purpose of this class, I will continue to build upon it. I believe this project was the perfect foundation for my start to understanding how to live a healthier life style. I am thankful for this learning experience, as I have learned not only how develop good habits for the better. In part two of the book, Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, Pink discusses three elements of Type I behavior (intrinsic motivation) and how individuals and organizations are using them to improve performance and deepen satisfaction. These three elements are: autonomy, the desire to be self-directed, mastery, the urge to make progress and get better at what we do, and purpose, our yearning to contribute and be apart of something larger.
Autonomy- Pink describes autonomy as part of human nature and states it is the "rely-on-nobody individualism of the American cowboy." He also goes on to state that autonomy empathizes choice and "wired to be active and engaged." Pink describes four "essentials" in creating a workplace that values autonomy. These four essentials are time, technique, team, and task. Within time, Pink introduces as interesting concept called "ROWE" (results only work environment). This is a workplace that does not have schedules; workers can show up and leave as they wish, but they are still capable of getting their work done. It focuses more on the output (results) rather than the time/scheduling, allowing more flexibility when completing tasks. Within technique, Pink says that employers should not dictate how employees should complete their task, but rather provide initial guidance and then let them tackle the project in the manner they wish. Pink goes on to state that within the team, employees should be allowed some choice over who they work with. Lastly, for task, Pink states that employees should be given 'creative' days where they can work on any project/problem they wish. Mastery- allow employees to become better at something that matter to them. In the chapter of the book, Pink introduces the term "Goldilocks tasks." He uses this term to describe those task which are neither overly difficult or overly simple. Pink states that these tasks allow employees to extend themselves and develop their skills. Furthermore, Pink says creating an environment where mastery is possible is to create an environment where learning and development are fostered. Purpose- taking steps to fulfill employees' natural desire to contributing to a greater cause. Pink states employers should communicate the purpose so employees understand the purpose and vision of their organizations He goes on so say that employers should also place emphasis on purpose maximization and organization and individual goals should also focus on purpose. Lastly, Pink encourages to use purpose-oriented words and talk about the organization as a united team and use work such as "us" and "we". In conclusion, applying these three elements to your life can help increase one to become more intrinsically motivated and thus lead into gaining a Type I behavior. Furthermore, these elements could help individuals and organizations to improve their performance and deepen satisfaction Kid Blog is a tool that teachers can use within their classroom to provide students with their own blogging page. Below is a screen cast video that I have created which gives an overview of how the website works, how to set up student blog pages, and some of Kid Blog's features. This a really fun and unique tool to utilize in the classroom, especially with today's 21st Century Learners! One of the requirements within my Learning and Technology class this semester is to create a Digital Pedagogy. Within our digital pedagogy, we are required to create a project using any medium of our choice teaching someone how to do something.
One idea that I was thinking of doing was creating lessons to teach students at an elementary school level how to use the internet to research and other various research skills. While working on my action research, I found that my students, whom are considered "digital natives", had a very difficult time completing their research assignment thus displaying they did not possess the basic research skills. I had the naive perception that my students, because they were capable of teaching me how to use various applications and resources on the computer, they would be able to navigate and research after just a short mini lesson. I quickly learned that this was not the case. Today, as students are moving into utilizing the internet as a resource on a daily basis, I believe teaching students these skills at a young age and allowing them to obtain these resources will be very beneficial for their future. For my choice book, I have been reading or more so "listening" to Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us by Daniel H. Pink. (I resorted to listening to the audiobook after I realized I was reading this book at a much slower pace than I wanted). Pink begins the book by using the metaphor of motivation as that of an operating system. He tells readers that humans initial operating system, which he calls Motivation 1.0 was survival. Motivation 1.0 worked well, that was until society started to get more complex. Pink states an operating system based purely on the biological drive was inadequate. "In fact, sometimes we needed ways to restrain this drive -- to prevent me from swiping your dinner and you from stealing my spouse." (pg. 16). This is when humans replaced Motivation 1.0 with Motivation 2.0, the more current system we work and live in. This second drive, Motivation 2.0, stated that humans set out to seek reward and avoid punishments. Motivation 2.0 is built entirely around rewards and punishments and what Pink refers to as "carrots and sticks". Motivation 2.0 is based of external forces; rewarding the behavior that one seeks and punishing the behavior that one discourages. Pink goes on to state that today we've configured our organizations and constructed our lives around the assumption, "The way to improve performance, increase productivity, and encourage excellence is to reward the good and punish the bad." Furthermore, Motivation 2.0 utilizes the system of "If-then" rewards, which pretty much states, "If you do this, then you'll get that." This system did extremely well and made huge achievements; but as much operating systems do, it calls for an upgrade. This is where Motivation 3.0 comes into play. This operating system still keeps the same outlooks of Motivation 1.0 and Motivation 2.0 stating humans still have the behavioral drive for survival as well as the drive for reward and punishment; but it also states that humans have a drive to to direct their own lives. Pink goes on to state that Motivation 3.0 is the operating system we need to meet new realities of how we organize, think about, and do what we do. He says that this kind of operating system can only be fostered by what he calls "Type I behavior." Type I behavior is a behavior that concerns itself with more intrinsic desires and more with the inherent satisfaction of itself. Pink goes on to state that Type I behavior is more self-directed and devoted to becoming better and better at something. "For Type I's, the main motivator is freedom, challenge, and purpose of the undertaking itself; any other gains are welcome, but mainly as a bonus" (pg. 76). To end, Pink believes this drive is revolved around three elements: autonomy, mastery, and purpose, which I will discuss further in another post. Question for thought: Do you considered yourself to have Type I behavior? If not, what can you change in your lives to have more a Type I behavior? As I was browsing through Pinterest for a new smoothie recipe, I came across a "Banana Avocado Smoothie" and wondered what that would taste like. I absolutely love avocados but never imagined they would be part of a smoothie and couldn't begin to imagine how it would taste. I started to look more into avocado smoothies, I was surprised to see multiple recipes for a smoothie of this sort. As I was researching, I also learned that avocado smoothies make a great base for high-energy smoothies. Since I needed a little energy boost this morning, I decided I would give it a try with the ingredients I had at home. My smoothie consisted of:
Until next time, -Marina Eating healthy, another essential to living a healthier lifestyle. For basically my entire life, I was always a super thin little person and could eat just about anything that I wanted and not worry about the effects. Now, going into my early adult years, that is clearly not the case. Horrible "college eating habits" definitely took a toll on my body. Between feeling too busy and exhausted too cook at home, eating one big meal about once a day, surviving off of coffee and eating out for just about every social event you can think of, I look back and realize just how horrible my eating habits were. Last year, I slowly but surely started changing my eating habits but always found it only lasting a few weeks here and there. I was never really willing to fully change what I ate because I enjoy my fatty foods. Not until I finally noticed small differences in my weight but also my dramatic changes in skin, was I determined to start eating better on a regular basis. Here are some of the small changes I started making:
As part of my 20% project, another one of my goals was also to learn about healthier food recipes to strive to continue eating better. Come to find out, there is a mass amount of communities who share and post their healthy food recipes. I have started following numerous amount of individuals via Instagram who post pictures and even short simple videos (which I love) of their recipes. I have also continued to pin different recipes and knowledgable articles about healthier eating habits via Pinterest. One of my favorite followers is Fitmencook. I am always inspired to cook just about every recipe he posts; they all look so delicious! Although I have taken some of his ideas and made them my own, his always look so much better. To end, I feel as though I still have a lot to learn about eating healthier and maybe understanding what to eat and when to eat it. For example, pre-post workout meals, meals to lose weight, meals for protein intake, energy, food substitutions, etc. Eventually I want to be able to gain a better understanding of all that but for now I am feeling accomplished with the minor changes I have made to my eating habits. Here are some of the dishes I've made throughout my 20% project: Until next time, Happy Eating!
-Marina As I started this journey of "living a healthier lifestyle", one of the my goals within my 20% project was to improve my overall long distance running as well as to participate in a running event. For the past few months, I have been using the Nike Running App as part of my training. This application has a "Coach" feature in which one can choose different settings to help you train based on your own individual preferences. I set my application to help me train for a 5K. This training, which was a series of weeks, mixed walking, running, cross-training, and rest to help build my overall running and endurance, without overdoing the training to avoid injuring myself. As you can see in the picture above, the application records my runs (the distance and time). It also has neat features in which it notify's you when you have beat your own run times, set new records, and you can also add others who have the application to see their progress as well. I have tried really hard these past few months to keep with my training and I could happily say that I have made a good amount of progress. This past weekend, I participated in the Hot Chocolate 5K Run, which promotes and raises awareness for the Ronald McDonald Charity. I participated in this run with two of my cousins, who are avid participants in running events, especially Disney Runs. They were also a huge part of my motivation to participate in this run and due to the fact I was pretty disappointed I missed out on their last 10K Tinkerbell Run at Disneyland, I was pretty excited to join them this time around. As I went into the run, I had a pretty solid idea of my running habits at this time. I knew was able to successfully run a 5K with minimal stops, if none at all, within a the time span of 30-35 minutes. My goal was to run the entire 5K without stopping and to keep within that time limit of 30-35 minutes. To my surprise though, this course was not a flat run but more hills than anything! The entire first mile was entirely running up hill, followed by a great big hill in the second mile, and third mile was when I felt like I could actually catch a break. Finishing the run, I felt great and pretty successful considering how much of it was uphill but because I knew I had walked more than I had planned during the second mile (up that gigantic hill), I was almost certain that I would not beat the time that I had originally planned. Again, to my surprise I was wrong. I ended up finishing my 5K in 30 minutes 02 seconds which was a 1 minute and 23 seconds better than my last 5K I ran in the previous month. After seeing these results, I was pretty thrilled and happy with my accomplishments with running. I am now even more motivated to continue running and shoot for better times and knock out a 10K this next time around. Until next time, Happy Running! -Marina |
AuthorMarina Sandoval Archives
May 2014
Healthy && Fit Pinning |